Monday, July 25, 2011

"Minnesota Auburn in crouched run 30 miles east of Saint Paul" 7/6/11 Farmer and his wife film 5 seconds of an Auburn Sas with his new Iphone as he walked the woods next to his hayfield. They hear a low grunting sound. They actually thought it was a deer running until they looked on the computer a few days later. Found by Candy at SasquatchwatchCanada w/ 2 views, we saw it next w/ 7. Confirms All over Auburn hair, high shoulders, gray hands, Pigmentation line on hand, muscles move when right foot stomps.

Mikey has also been lucky enough to have a Class 1 encounter (full visual) of a male Sasquatch at about 25 yards in daylight conditions while looking for more footprints.

He is well known for his ability to establish encounter areas where the sasquatch will actually trade with them. He heads up a research organization known as Sasquatch Investigations of the Rockies (SIR), which is dedicated to documenting and interacting with the sasquatch people.
You won't want to miss Mikey's wonderful accounts and abilities to establish trading and friendships with the sasquatch people. SIR's website can be found at

Ivan Marx (b. ???? d. 1999) was a well-known bigfoot researcher and film-maker who made several allegedly hoaxed films of bigfoot, most of which were gathered into 3 films, The Legend of Bigfoot (1976), In The Shadow of Bigfoot (1981) and Bigfoot Alive And Well In '82 (early or mid-'80's).

Many bigfoot Researchers allege that Marx's films are nothing more than hoaxes, and that Marx's wife Peggy was in the gorilla suits filmed by Marx. Marx was involved in the Bossburg, Washington Cripple Foot track finds of November 1969, and in October 1970, claimed to have captured film footage of the crippled bigfoot, although he turned down an offer of $25,000 for the footage if he could confirm its authenticity.

Marx was a mentor to controversial researcher Tom Biscardi.

Original Ivan Marx Bigfoot footage, whether your a believer or a skeptic, you've got to see this!

Read below for more on the Ivan Marx footage:

Bigfoot Encounters

The Hoaxed Ivan Marx Footage
as told by Peter Byrne, former head of "The Bigfoot Project..."
THE MARX FOOTAGE ...

Some bumbling statements have recently been made via Internet lists about the original Ivan Marx 1971 Bigfoot film footage and my association with it. The origin of the statements, the person who made them, is unimportant. But in them the footage is described as an actual film and it is suggested that at the time Marx produced it, I am guilty, with the end in view of commercial gain, of exhibited it to local, “dignitaries” in Bossburg, northern Washington, where Ivan Marx lived at that time and of making, as a result, “Lord knows how much money.” The statements, like others that emanate from this same petulant source on a boringly regular basis are, as I can prove, blatantly untrue.

First, let’s set the record straight. When I was associated with Ivan Marx, which was for the brief three months that he worked for me in early 1971, there was no film. There was a short piece of 16 mm film footage made by him, of what he said was a Bigfoot, that ran for about 30 seconds. That, truly, is all there ever was.

Ivan Marx, an amateur cine photographer (and a mediocre woods - man), shot the footage in late 1970-or so he said- and when I came on the scene in early 1971 my job, as the primary focus of a new Bigfoot research program, was to examine the footage, determine its authenticity and then, like my work as designer and director of the original northern Californian Bigfoot project, -follow up with full time research.

When I first met Marx at the start of the 1971 Bigfoot Project - at which time I recruited him into my team as a salaried, full-time employee and provided him with camping gear, outdoor clothing, a snowmobile and a new International Scout - he told me that his BF encounter began with an early morning call from a railway train driver who said that his engine had hit a Bigfoot the night before; the man, Marx said, gave him the location of the accident and so the same day, without delay, he set out to track and find the Bigfoot. There was a blood trail, he stated, that led him up into some 4000/4500 high foothills, roughly six miles north and east of Bossburg, Washington. About midday, in bright sunshine and under a clear sky, close to the deep snowline of the upper hills, he caught up with the Bigfoot, which, he said, was limping and appeared to be injured. The creature, he stated, weighed at least 650 pounds, was covered with thick, dark brown hair and stood a minimum of eight feet in height.

Still photograph generated from a 16mm film footage hoaxed
by the late Ivan Marx & his widow,
Mrs. Peggy Marx in the year 1977.

Marx said that as soon as he saw the creature he turned his 16 mm movie camera on and shot about 30 seconds of footage, in three ten-second sequences, and then, dropping the camera, which he apparently carried on a shoulder strap, he quickly and with seconds to spare, pulled out his still camera and took half a dozen pictures. The Bigfoot then disappeared and so he left the area and walked back down to a main road. There, coming out of the woods, he met several people, among them Norm Davis, the owner operator of the Colville Radio Station, Bill Harper, a Department of Immigration and Naturalization officer and Don Byington, a local rancher who later joined my research team; he told them that he had caught up with the Bigfoot and had been able to get footage and still pictures of it.

Discussing the event with Marx, he told me that the place where he got the footage definitely had more Bigfoot living in it. He had, he said, seen several sets of fresh footprints while tracking the injured one and that as soon as it was spring and the snow drifts melted off, he would lead me in there and we could get more footage.

In the meantime, the area being too rugged for snowmobile access, he suggested we wait for the snow to clear; I agreed and in turn told him that in the interim he could work for me on full salary, with all expenses, on general research in the Bossburg and Colville area.

As to the footage itself, which he wanted to sell to the Bigfoot Project’s sponsors for $25,000, I guaranteed him this amount, to be paid after we had thoroughly examined it and were satisfied with its authenticity; in return, as a guarantee of good faith, he agreed to let us hold the master copy. He gave this to me in a sealed metal film container and I immediately sent it by registered mail to Washington DC, to the offices of my attorneys there, to be held in trust, unopened, until such time as we made a positive decision about the work. He also gave me, on request, a working copy of the footage, for study and analysis, allowing me to take selected 8X10 prints from this for the same purpose; in addition, he gave me enlargements of the still pictures he said he had taken of his film subject.

The first cracks in the authenticity of the footage appeared when I was about two and a half months into the project, in late March 1971 and they surfaced one evening during a study showing of the work copy of the footage at the home of Don Byington at his ranch about a mile to the east of Marx’s Bossburg home.

Present at the showing were Don, his young son Stephen-about eight at the time, Don’s wife, Alta, Dennis Jensen, a veteran Bigfoot research who had worked with Roger Patterson and was now a member of my research team, Bill Harper and Norm Davis with his wife. (These, incidentally, were probably the local “dignitaries” referred to by the accusatory source mentioned at the beginning of this article; at the least, I feel sure, they would all have been delighted to be have been given this elevating title.)

When the showing was over, I heard young Stephen whisper to his father that he recognized the place seen in the footage, the place that Marx said was the site of his Bigfoot encounter; the boy was puzzled, he said, because the place was not six miles north of Marx’s house, in the hills, as Marx had stated, but actually at the edge of the forest that bordered the northern boundary of their ranch.

Steven’s remarks were heard by others but were discounted at the time as the imagination of an impressionable young boy. But later that night, lying in bed in my research base house at Evans, a scattering of small houses about half way between Colville and Bossburg, and listening to the bitter winds of the end of winter howling in the frozen trees, I kept thinking about what the boy had said; and I found myself bothered by it.

Next day I went to see Don and his wife and a little later that morning, accompanied by Don, Bill Harper, Dennis Jensen and Norm Davis, young Stephen led us on a search for the place he thought he recognized as the footage site. Sure enough, we soon found it and, using the two sets of 8X10 enlargements, from the footage and the still pictures, were very quickly able to positively identify it via objects clearly seen in both the pictures and at the site itself. These later included large rocks, stones, dead branches, frozen cow droppings, a rusting piece of metal from an old tractor and, most important, a small tree past which Marx’s “creature” is seen moving in the footage, a tree with a horizontal branch under which it walks, without stooping, just before it disappears. The branch, it was noted by all, measured six feet from the ground; to walk under it, without stooping, the subject of the footage could only have been a maximum of five feet eleven inches in height.

We said nothing to Marx about our discovery, which was plainly that he had misled us about the site of the footage, but continued to employ him, his principal job being to search for footprints. (He reported finding several sets over the course of some weeks but for various reasons was never able to lead us back to them.) In the meantime we pondered on our discovery, and privately discussed it, and it worried us.

In the last days of March I got a call from Norm Davis. He said that he had made an important discovery about the footage and that I should come quickly to his offices at the radio station in Colville. I did so and there found Don Byington, Bill Harper and Dennis Jensen waiting.

Norm sat us down around his desk, on which he had laid out the aforementioned two sets of enlargements. He brought us all coffee, waited while we examined the pictures and then said, “So, do you see it? Do you see what I’ve discovered?”

We could not see whatever it was he wanted us to see and so he leaned forward and pointed. The film subject, in both sets of pictures, photographed in bright sunshine, had a distinctive shadow. And the shadow angles of each set were different, clearly indicating that the two phases of photography - the movie photography, and the still shot - had been carried out at different times and not, as Marx had told us, seconds apart.

We had a brief meeting and then decided that it was time to have a serious talk with Mr. Ivan Marx to ask him, among other things, how he could have been mistaken - to put it kindly - about the site of his filming and how it was that the movie footage and the still pictures appeared to have been taken at different intervals. And so next morning, at six am-to confront our enigmatic employee while he was still drinking coffee, so to speak, we all went to Marx’s rented home, a dilapidated tar paper shack just off the highway at Bossburg, to find out what he had to say about the little discrepancies in his story.

Alas, we were too late. In the night-as was clearly indicated by the discarded personal belongings strewn across his front yard, our quarry had got wind of our plans and, as they say, had upped and run for cover. And in a hurry he left a veritable river of trash running from the open, flapping-in-the-wind front door of the shack to where he parked his Volkswagen Bug, one that included ancient and tattered magazines and newspapers, old patched and re-patched gum boots, torn cotton towels, plastic rain coats, ragged shirts, woolen hats, ripped up, oil and grease stained work shirts and trousers, empty motor oil containers, rusting baked bean and soup cans, stained and ragged blankets, mayonnaise and jam and pickle jars and dog food cartons and half filled trash bags. (In answer to the unspoken question, no, the abandoned garbage did not contain a fur suit.)

Marx headed, as we heard later, for Burney, a town in northern California where he lived before coming north to make his Bigfoot film and find fame and fortune in the Bigfoot world and, yes, as was to be expected, we never saw or heard from him again.

Meanwhile, back in Washington DC, Marx’s original footage supposedly lay in the office safe of my attorneys and that posed a question… in the light of our discovery of the fact that the footage was obviously a total fabrication, were we justified in opening the sealed canister that he had left with us in good faith, pending its purchase by us for an agreed $25,000? I consulted with the members of my team and then made a call and told my attorneys to go ahead and open it. They did this, to find that the canister did indeed contain probably a hundred feet of neatly coiled film. Original Bigfoot footage of Marx’s immortal achievement? Alas no, or if you like, laughingly no… for what the wily Mr. Ivan Marx had given us was about a hundred small cut pieces of old Disney, black and white Mickey Mouse footage from the fifties and sixties.

The Marx “film” from which we all made “Lord knows how much money?” - There never was a film.
And there certainly was never any money made from it. How could there be, when it never existed?

Later, I understand, Mr. Marx went on to make several full-length Bigfoot films, which he distributed commercially. Some of them, I have been told, are quite extraordinary-hilarious might be a better word - and show Bigfoots swimming, running and jumping, bathing in a river, playing kick-the-can, climbing trees and, in one case, actually waving at the photographer! But this was later, and not while we were associated with him. Nope.

All we got for our honest efforts was Mickey Mouse and, darn it, not even in color.

Sunday, July 24, 2011

Tim Fasano is cautiously optimistic about what the Erickson Project will unveil. For over a year now, we've been hearing "leaked" stories from people close to the Erickson Project about the results of the study being done on DNA samples taken from different Sasquais (yes, that's a new word first coined by Richard Stubstad).

Here's a brief history of what has happened over the past months regarding the Bigfoot DNA samples and the shooting(s).

In 1912 Charles Dawson held a press conference in London with an important announcement. He had discovered during a dig in the Piltdown region of England a fossil of an ancient skull. Dawson believed this skull was a bridge between Neanderthal and modern man, the missing link. The best part of all of this was the fossil was English!

Java man and Neanderthal had been discovered in the middle of the nineteenth century and scientist needed a bridge. Dawson was going to deliver with this important discovery. He and his workers had been digging for months over the last year and found several parts of a skull and a jaw bone. The skull was able to house a very large brain and the jaw was more monkey like to chew vegetation and meat. The scientific world was excited about this find. They had, however, failed to notice of critique some obvious things. In short, scientific method was played with fast and loose.

Piltdown Skull

Dawson had been working on his own and the only scientific controls of his dig were the ones he would impose. Since his crew was working alone, they could do whatever they wanted. That would include fudge data, time lines, and offer no accounting for the procurement of samples and under what conditions these samples had been found. Much less, any possibility of experimentation or repeatability of results.

What Dawson had done was put together an orangutan jaw bone with a modern human skull. He exposed all sample's to acid and dye to make them appear to be very old. The part of the skull that connects to the vertebrae was the orangutan. Scientist bought his hoax hook line and sinker. The reason? They were just as eager as him to believe and prove man evolved from apes.

If you go to a bookstore that has old books that predate 1953, you will find books that show the evolutionary path of man and apes with the Piltdown man being the most significant of the lnages. For decades this was taught in schools and nobody had a clue. The very people who should of questioned this, did not.

The fossil was rarely taken out of its case and nobody was allowed to examine it. They only had access to replications. How could scientist of not questioned that? Simple, they wanted to believe. That is what I fear is going on in Bigfoot research today mainly in the form of the Erickson Project with Dr. Melba Ketchum.

Nobody has seen the samples that are being DNA tested. Nobody knows where these samples are being tested, and nobody can examine any of this important work. We are just told that one day all of this will come out. The conditions under which any of this 'evidence' was gathered in the field is suspect at best. You only have to just take their word for it like in the Piltdown Man.

This is Piltdown Man

I don't mean to be so skeptical, but none of this is even close to being the way science should advance. There is a large amount of money to be made and we all know what happens when money can change hands. University research this is not. Lets not let this junk science fool a lot of people.

I was just thinking about the bigfoot scenario and had these questions . So I put together a quick video with them.

I've been taking a short break from the forest routine to give it a rest for a little while. The heat , and drought , and lack of food along with my presence in the forest may not have the desired effect on the creatures I'm looking for . So a short pause in the recording of activitey.

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany compared the abilities and skills of chimps, orangutans and two year old humans. They found that human children were better at social learning.

Social learning

Researchers love to compare humans to our close relatives the great apes. This video shows footage of a study that compared the physical and social skills of orang-utans, chimps and 2-year-old children.

Humans and apes had similar concepts of the physical world, but the researchers found that humans were better at social learning. The toddlers could recognise non-verbal cues better than the apes and were also more likely to learn by example.

However, the tests did ask the apes to learn from humans. Perhaps they would be better at learning from their own species?

Nat Geo's amazing documentary about Bigfoot featuring Dr. Jeff Meldrum. In our opinion, one of best, if not the best documentary on Sasquatch.

The show begins by telling us a story about a man named Patterson who took film footage of a Bigfoot in Northern California in the late '60s. Of course, debunkers immediately said it was a hoax -- just a guy in a suit. The show pretty well put the hoax claim to rest.

Without going into all of the details of each point, the main points were that Hollywood "creature suit makers" say the technology to make a suit look and act like the creature in the film did not exist in the late '60s and still doesn't. Anatomical experts say the proportions are wrong for a human and right for an ape. Finally, it is possible to calculate the actual height of something in an image if you know the distance from camera to subject, the size of the image on the frame of film and the focal length of the lens. The camera used at the time came with 15 and 25 mm lenses. The 15mm lens was in use and the distance was stated to be 100 feet by the guy with Patterson. Combined with image size in the frame (I think they said it was .44") this leads to a height of 7'6", give or take a bit. Further, the length of primate feet is generally about 15% of body height. Plaster casts of Patterson's Bigfoot footprints were measured at 14" and that comes out to about the same height. There aren't many 7'6" humans.

The show also mentioned the numerous blood and hair samples that have been collected over the years. They have found that some of the hair samples do not match the hair of any known forest animals like bears, elk, pumas, etc. These hair samples are from primates but are not from any known primates like humans, gorillas, chimps, orangutans, etc. The same holds true for some of the blood samples. Of course, in science, proving a sample isn't something does not prove it is something else but the process of elimination certainly leaves the question open.

Date: Summer of 1978Location: 2 lane mountainous road in OregonWitnesses: Two teenagers, ages 15 and 17Context: Witnesses saw something large and dark at the edge of our headlights (my side) LEAPT out of the Ditch at the side of the road. "Both my cousin and I screamed and he instinctively swerved into the other lane to avoid this thing."Source:www.abovetopsecret.com

[...]
During the Summer of 1978 when I was 15, my family (total of 7 people - 2 adults, 5 children ranging in age from 9 to 17) drove a motor home from Florida to Alaska as a Summer Vacation. Our route was to take us across Country to California and then North. Having decided to drive "round the clock" most of the way there and back - it was decided that the 3 eligible drivers would take shifts with one other person in the passengers seat as a "Navigator" - My assignment as Navigator (since I could not drive) was with my 17 year old Cousin.

One of the shifts my cousin and I were assigned was the midnight to 6am shift that would take us from Northern California well into Oregon. We were experienced travelers and the family had taken driving trips around the US, Canada and Mexico since I was 9. I had visited every State in the US except Hawaii and Alaska by this point in my life.

We were traveling on a 2 lane mountainous road in Orgeon around 3 am, we were the only vehicle on the road and had not seen another car for a couple of hours. My cousin and I were making small talk (trying to keep it down becuase everyone else was asleep) when we rounded a turn....something large and dark at the edge of our headlights (my side) LEAPT out of the Ditch at the side of the road. Both my cousin and I screamed and he instinctively swerved into the other lane to avoid this thing. As we passed this thing (15-20 ft. from me) it turned and I assume leapt back into the Ditch/woods. It was hard to see any details as we passed because we had a light on inside the cab but it was DEFINITELY standing erect and had a head, shoulders and arms..and was HUGE - The most vivid memory that has stayed with me from this was the sight of its right shoulder and arm as it turned while we passed it.

The screaming and commotion woke everyone up and we were well down the road before my mother made us stop the vehicle. My mother was concerned that there might have been an accident and that this might have just been a very large man needing help...it was my argument that if this were the case that he had asked for it the WRONG WAY..but over our protestations she took the wheel as we went back to the spot where the incident occurred. A VERY quick inspection of the "Ditch" showed no signs af any accident or sign of the "thing" - what was interesting was that this "Ditch" was actually a steep sloping bank down to a water run-off or small stream and was a good 4 plus feet deep. No MAN could have made that LEAP out of this ditch.

This strange creature was found in the owner of the Banff Indian Trading Post, Norman Luxton's basement after he died sometime in the 1960s. Luxton also happened to be married to the first white woman in the province of Alberta.

Luxton bought the Merman in 1915 and crafted a vague story about its origins to help promote the Trading Post, which at that time sold beadwork and quilts made by natives from the nearby Stoney Reserve.

The Merman is a petrified, three-foot, half-man half-fish curio in a glass case in the back room of the Indian Trading Post, an old cabin hawking authentic native artifacts and tourist souvenirs on the south side of the Banff Avenue bridge. Ripley's Believe it or Not Museum once offered the family $300,000 for the Merman.

The Merman is bizarre enough to draw interest, looks realistic enough to maintain plausibility, and facts about it are kept vague enough to keep skeptics at bay. On the Merman's glass case is a weathered article from The Beaver magazine, dated September, 1942, with a handwritten note scribbled in the margins: "This is all we know about the Merman."

Friday, July 22, 2011

According to the BFRO, there have been 0 reports of Bigfoot sightings in Hawaii. A timeline history from bigfootdiscoverymuseum.com suggests Bigfoot crossed the land bridge from Asia to Northwest Territories about 13,000 years ago. Unfortunately for Bigfoot, there was never a land bridge from Asia to Hawaii, or was there?

That's the question a website named "Life's Little Mysteries" is asking. They noted that Texas Penal Code 42.09 on animal cruelty states a person who "kills, seriously injures, or administers poison to an animal, other than cattle, horses, sheep, swine, or goats, belonging to another without legal authority or the owner's effective consent," could be charged with a felony offense.

A Texas boy killed what he claims is the legendary vampire beast "el chupacabra" last weekend. Carter Pope (also identified as Carter Sinclair), 13, shot the animal three times on Sunday near his home in La Salle, Texas. He saw the four-legged, doglike animal walking across an open field, but it didn't look exactly like a dog: "It had no hair at all on it," he told local media. "Its back legs were shriveled up. I honestly think it's a chupacabra."

Pope is eagerly awaiting confirmation of his historic chupacabra find through DNA analysis of tissues his father sent to a lab. If history is any guide, the chupacabra — which means "goat sucker" in Spanish and is named for its reputed habit of sucking the blood out of small animals, including goats and chickens — will soon be revealed as a known member of the canid family, a group that includes dogs, coyotes and foxes. (The creature Pope shot was not seen, nor suspected of, sucking blood out of anything; it was merely walking across a field.)

Previous "chupacabras" killed or found in Texas have all been identified as known animals, including domestic dogs, coyotes and even a raccoon. Many of the animals get their hairless (or nearly hairless) look from a common skin disease called sarcoptic mange, caused by mites. Other animals may be hairless because of a genetic defect. Then there's the Xolo dog, a hairless breed from Mexico that has occasionally sparked chupacabra stories.

Pope's story has attracted both national and international attention, fueling renewed speculation about the world's No. 3 best-known mystery beast (after Bigfoot and the Loch Ness monster). But the fact that a Texas teen shot and killed a mangy dog or coyote is perhaps less interesting than the question of why he thought it was dreaded chupacabra in the first place — and what type of trouble he might have gotten himself into.

The chupacabra myth only dates back to 1995, when an eyewitness sighted the monster in Puerto Rico. Later research, published in my book "Tracking the Chupacabra," showed that the original chupacabra report was not real, and instead described a monster in a science fiction film. Since then, no hard evidence of the beast has emerged, and the story has been kept alive by occasional feral, hairless canids such as the one Pope shot — even though they look nothing like the original description.

Ironically, Carter Pope may end up getting in trouble with animal rights advocates — or even the law. Pope, a minor, presumably had his parents' written permission to carry the rifle he used as required by Texas law. But just because a person sees an animal he or she doesn't recognize doesn't necessarily mean they have the right to shoot and kill it on a whim. The animal was not attacking anyone or anything, nor being a nuisance.

And while the creature was probably a feral dog or coyote, it could be a neighbor's missing, sick pet. If the animal turns out to be a dog, Pope could potentially be charged with a felony. Texas Penal Code 42.09 on animal cruelty states a person who "kills, seriously injures, or administers poison to an animal, other than cattle, horses, sheep, swine, or goats, belonging to another without legal authority or the owner's effective consent," could be charged with a felony offense. (The degree of the felony can be upgraded if a person is a repeat offender.)

A clue as to why the boy thought it was a chupacabra in the first place can be found in his father's comment that, "I know it looks like nothing I have ever personally seen before." Pope and his father assumed that if the creature were a known animal, they would recognize it. In fact, the animal looks identical to thousands of mangy dogs and coyotes roaming North America. This is the same logic that UFO believers employ, assuming that any strange light in the sky they can't identify must be an alien spacecraft.

The lesson is that just because you don't recognize something you see doesn't mean it's mysterious (or that you should kill it). That, and shooting a dog or coyote will make international news if you call it a chupacabra.

The Pamir mountains, lying in a remote region where the borders of Tadzhikistan, China, Kashmir, and Afghanistan meet, have been the scene of many Almas sightings.

In 1925, Mikhail Stephanovitch Topilski, a major general in the Soviet army, led his unit in an assault on an anti-Soviet guerilla force (White Russian Army) hiding in a cave in the Pamirs. The Red Army troops searched the rugged terrain hearing tales of a beast-man who lived in the higher reaches of the soaring Vanch Mountains. They came upon a cave that looked to be a likely stronghold for their White Army enemies.

The commanding officer ordered his men to open fire into the cave's opening. To their shock, a wild hairy creature ran from the cave's mouth crying inarticulately into a hail of bullets. It fell to the ground, mortally wounded. Several minutes passed before the officer and his troops approached the stilled beast, sprawled out in the dirt before them, quiescent, lifeless.

One of the surviving guerillas said that while in the cave he and his comrades were attacked by several apelike creatures. Topilski ordered the rubble of the cave searched, and the body of one such creature was found. Topilski reported: "At first glance I thought the body was that of an ape. It was covered with hair all over. But I knew there were no apes in the Pamirs. Also, the body itself looked very much like that of a man. We tried pulling the hair, to see if it was just a hide used for disguise, but found that it was the creature's own natural hair. We turned the body over several times on its back and its front, and measured it."

"The body," continued Topilski, "belonged to a male creature 165-170 cm [about 5 1/2 feet] tall, elderly or even old, judging by the grayish color of the hair in several places. The chest was covered with brownish hair and the belly with grayish hair. The hair was longer but sparser on the chest and close-cropped and thick on the belly. In general the hair was very thick, without any under fur. There was least hair on the buttocks, from which fact our doctor deduced that the creature sat like a human being. There was most hair on the hips. The knees were completely bare of hair and had callous growths on them. The whole foot including the sole was quite hairless and was covered by hard brown skin. The hair got thinner near the hand, and the palms had none at all but only callous skin."

Topilski added: "The color of the face was dark, and the creature had neither beard nor mustache. The temples were bald and the back of the head was covered by thick, matted hair. The dead creature lay with its eyes open and its teeth bared. The eyes were dark and the teeth were large and even and shaped like human teeth. The forehead was slanting and the eyebrows were very powerful. The protruding jawbones made the face resemble the Mongol type of face. The nose was flat, with a deeply sunk bridge. The ears were hairless and looked a little more pointed than a human being's with a longer lobe. The lower jaw was very massive. The creature had a very powerful chest and well developed muscles. The arms were of normal length, the hands were slightly wider and the feet much wider and shorter than man's."

Thursday, July 21, 2011

In 2009, a journal was published making the connection between black bear sightings and Bigfoot. Using a technique called Climate Space Modelling (an approach that uses observations of a given species to determine the range of environmental variables under which it will occur), they can compared the distribution of Bigfoot with ecological niche models (ENMs) for the black bear, Ursus americanus. The model suggest that many sightings of this cryptozoid may be cases of mistaken identity.

I have been involved in “climate space modelling” for a few years now. This is an approach that uses observations of a given species to determine the range of environmental variables under which it will occur. Once you know what the limits of its tolerance are, you can predict where the species will occur. For example, let’s say that a damselfly (of course I’m using a hypothetical damselfly) can live at temperature of between 10 and 20 degrees and precipitation has to be between 200mm and 500mm per year. Warmer, wetter, cooler or drier than that and it can’t survive. We can use these limits to predict (i) where the species currently exists but has not been recorded, and (ii) where the species might exist in the future as the climate changes.

Figure 2

These climate models have been used for many different taxa, but recently I came across the first example of such a model being applied to a cryptid. ”Cryptid” is the name given to any postulated species that has not been conclusively documented. Notable examples include the Loch Ness Monster in Scotland and the Chupacabra in Mexico. This study used a database of Sasquatch sightings from the western USA to infer the climatological requirements of this particular cryptid. The point of the study was to demonstrate that researchers can provide apparently meaningful data without any actual biological understanding of the concepts. In this case, we have little or no evidence of the existence of Sasquatch, and yet the researchers published an entire paper documenting its distributions.

However, rather than stopping at this facetious point (it was a paper published on April Fool’s Day), the authors compare the predicted distribution of Sasquatch with that of the black bear, Ursus americanus, using records from same area in which Sasquatch has been sighted. The overlap in distributions is marked and suggests that sightings of Sasquatch, a large, hairy, bipedal animal living in the forest, are mistaken sightings of the black bear, a large, hairy, sometimes bipedal animal living in the same forest… The authors conclude:

Although it is possible that Sasquatch and U. americanus share such remarkably similar bioclimatic requirements, we nonetheless suspect that many Bigfoot sightings are, in fact, of black bears.

In this Strange Days episode, Saget meets up with a group of hunters who spend their free time searching for Sasquatch -- or "Bigfoot," if you prefer. Bob is skeptical, but then -- while standing out in the forest in the middle of the night -- he hears a terrifying noise. And then he hears an even more terrifying one.

The show first aired in 2010, featuring Cliff Barackman, Bobo, and Matt Moneymaker. Matt was featured in the bonus cut.

Ranae Holland is a fisheries biologist who lives in Seattle, WA. She was born and raised in the Midwest, and has had an interest in bigfoot that was given to her by her father, a professional daredevil. Though not convinced that sasquatches are real animals, she continues to keep an open mind on the subject and happily examines any data that crosses her desk.

Ranae has spent a tremendous amount of time in the field. She specialized in the interactions between brown bears and salmon, which gives her unique insight into the potential interdependence between saquatches and fish.

Her fisheries research has taken her to such bigfoot hotspots as Prince of Wales Island, British Columbia, the Olympic Peninsula, and the Coast Mountains of Oregon. In several of these locations, she has made contacts with biologists, locals, and Native American Tribal representatives who share their bigfoot stories and encounters with her. She eagerly listens to what everyone has to say in order to clarify her own beliefs about the existence of sasquatches.

Ranae still works as a dedicated field biologist. She regularly works for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (www.noaa.gov), as well as private entities. Her most recent field research efforts have centered around the steelhead in Umpqua River in south central Oregon.

The intro to Bigfoot and Wildboy (1976-1979), spun-off from the Krofft Supershow. Gnarly!

Children's series about Wildboy, an orphan who was raised in the wilderness of the Pacific Northwest by the legendary Sasquatch. Wildboy and Bigfoot roamed the countryside stomping out pollution, capturing diabolical villains, and rescuing those in distress. Written by Marty McKee

This latest blobsquatch comes from SquatchMaster, the man who filmed the Bigfoot chase at Salt Fork Dam. Some say this man is a hoaxer, but he has almost 500 subscribers on his YouTube channel. If he's a hoaxer, he's a damn good one.

This video purportedly shows a young sasquatch holding onto a tree. In our opinion it's just a tree defect or a bark canker of some sort.

Bark canker

Video Description:

Uploaded by tcbjrbigfoot on Jul 20, 2011
I have done several of SquatchMaster's videos for enhancement for his private use but we both feel that this needs to be shown to the public. This is by far the best photo capture of the creature anywhere out there. Great capture SM you've got a shot to be proud of,I know I am.

The term "blobsquatch" refers to any vaguely bigfoot-shaped mass seen (or not) in an otherwise unremarkable photograph of trees. This also means "blurry indistinct objects in photos that could either be a real, live Bigfoot or, well, a branch, a shadow, a rock, a tree stump, a smudge on the lens, etc."

by Hasti Taghi
Posted on July 20, 2011 at 1:57 PM
Updated today at 3:42 PM

The Texas Parks and Wildlife are working to identify what one Texas boy believes to be a chupacabra.

The teen shot the alleged beast over the weekend. Carter says he spotted the strange animal across an open field.

"It just walked across and started shaking, slowly moving across. No hair at all on it. It's back legs were shriveled up. I mean, I honestly think it 's a chupacabra," says the teen.
Carter says the animal was about 200 feet away. He says he fired three shots before the alleged chupacabra stopped moving Carter says he ran to his parents' room, waking up his dad to come see what he had discovered.

"I thought maybe I'm dreaming or this kid is just crazy. But, probably a little bit of both," laughs Will Pope.

But Pope says when he went outside with his son, he was amazed at the strange creature.
The animal now lays on the ground, visible from the family's home.

Stories of alleged chupacabra sitings have been around for years. And pictures have surfaced on the internet. Some believe a chupacabra is an animal that sucks the blood of livestock. A peculiar-looking thing with barely any hair. For many, it is a thing of legends. But, some wildlife biologists believe it is a sick coyote or other wild animal.

"I can believe it either way. I know it looks like nothing I have ever personally seen before," says the surprised dad.

Right now hair and skin samples are being processed, and we can only wait to see what exactly the odd-looking creature is.

Here's the latest update of the Bigfoot DNA, Erickson Project, and Dr. Melba Ketchum. Robert Lindsay claims to know the name of the Bigfoot shooter. For now, he's not confirming or denying the shooters name. This will all come out with a little bit of research.

Has the Sierra Kills shooter been identified? The shooter who supposedly shot and killed 2 Bigfoots in the Sierra Nevada in October 2010 may have been identified. On a Cryptomundo thread here, a commenter with the handle “Nominay,” who also comments on this forum, suggests that the shooter is a man named Justin Smeja.

Justin Semja, Age 16. "Justin's 27-Inch California Muley"

Smeja is a 25 year old Californian, an avid hunter, who lives in Sacramento, California. That would place him in close proximity to the location of the Sierra Kills in Plumas County not far away. Here is a photo of Smeja with a mule deer her shot. He is only 16 years old in that picture.

Smeja is also a member of the Olympic Project. This ties in with what my source “Bear Hunter” told me. He said that the shooter got deeply involved with the Olympic Project after the shooting. Nominay says that a friend who was close to the shooting incident confirmed that Smeja is the shooter.

Justin Smeja was introduced to Derek Randles
after an encounter with a Sasquatch in the mountains of Northern Ca.
Texas native, he now makes his home near Sacramento California and
works in the construction trade. Avid hunter, tracker and fisherman,
Justin specializes in scent control and camera set up.

It’s not yet been confirmed that Smeja is the shooter, and I’m not going to reveal the shooter’s name, although I know what it is. On the Cryptomundo thread, there were some arguments back and forth about whether or not Smeja could be the shooter.

Photos of Ketchum study evidence revealed. Here are some photos of some of the evidence that is being used in Dr. Melba Ketchum’s DNA project.

This sample is from the skunk kill reported by JC Johnson from the Four Corners area. A Bigfoot reportedly trapped a skunk in an irrigation pipe and killed it. The Bigfoot was apparently injured by the broken pipe. Apparently there was some blood evidence from this incident that was submitted as Bigfoot blood.

The only information I have on this was that some of the evidence was tested for nuclear DNA (only a single gene), but not mitochondrial DNA, although the full sequence may have been done later on. The sample was submitted by JC Johnson. I found these photos on the Internet.

The dead skunk from the Bigfoot-skunk encounter

Blood, surely skunk blood but possibly
Bigfoot blood too, from the interior of the pipe.

Ketchum and Adrian Erickson back on speaking terms. Ketchum and Erickson are back in regular phone contact; however, the contacts have been described as “jockeying for position” on Ketchum’s part.

Ketchum burned her best friend for the money and glory. After Ketchum got herself a Hollywood lawyer and wrote up new NDA’s giving herself almost 100% of the proceeds from the study and everyone else close to zero, a number of people left the study because they refused to sign the new NDA.

An excellent female geneticist was on the team, and she was close to Ketchum. She refused to sign the new NDA, and Ketchum coldly dumped her from the team. This woman was distraught and absolutely devastated that her close friend would betray her like that for cash and fame.

Speculation about Ketchum’s competence is misguided. Although some of my sources have a low opinion of Ketchum as a scientist, I do not share that opinion. I think she’s a good scientist. However, in at least one sense, the criticism is misguided. For instance, on the James Randi forums, they are saying that Ketchum is not competent to do the DNA study because she doesn’t know what she is doing when it comes to DNA.

But in a way, it doesn’t matter, because she is not even doing a lot of the work herself. She is sending the work out blind to different labs and having them do the work. For instance, she will send the work out blind to Lab A, they will do the work and send it back to her. Then she will send it out to Lab B in the same fashion to check the work of Lab A and see if they can back it up.

In all cases, the samples testing positive as Bigfoot DNA are being done by labs other than Ketchum’s, and their work is being backed up by other labs. In all cases, the labs have agreed with each other on what is what is not Bigfoot DNA. So the samples really are being tested blind by multiple parties, and everything is testing out perfectly so far. This adds excellent weight to the science of her study.

Relationship between Erickson Project and Ketchum DNA project hard to describe. First of all, the EP is a minimal entity, probably for legal reasons. When you refer to the EP, you can only be talking about three whole human beings – despite the fact that a large number of other folks are associated with the project, you cannot refer to them as part of the project, probably for legal reasons.

Nevertheless, the two projects have deep ties. First of all, the EP are the people who enlisted Ketchum to do the DNA testing. This is not stated on the EP website, but this is what happened. She was not their first choice. They went to many others first, but all of those labs turned them down because they did not want to deal with the Bigfoot question. They went to her because she was the only one who would do Bigfoot DNA.

Also, the DNA results must be released in tandem with the EP video results. If Ketchum goes ahead and releases her study first, she can be sued by Erickson. So these two studies have a lot more in common than most think.

You first heard it from Matt Moneymaker, then you heard it from Bobo, and now we have the official word. Today, Animal Planet announces the return of FINDING BIGFOOT, with an order of 10 episodes where the search for the Sasquatch continues into the next chapter. The second season is scheduled for early 2012.

This summer, Animal Planet left a giant footprint possibly the size of a Sasquatch itself when it revealed its six-part series FINDING BIGFOOT, which just completed its first season. Ranking among the network's top three series, delivering 1.2M P2+ viewers, FINDING BIGFOOT found a sizeable audience among viewers, whether they believe in or question the existence of the elusive creature.

Today, Animal Planet announces the return of FINDING BIGFOOT, with an order of 10 episodes where the search for the Sasquatch continues into the next chapter. With a second season scheduled for early 2012, the network is committed to looking for the Bigfoot until it's found and has plans to explore reported sightings throughout the United States, including Utah, New Mexico, Indiana, Pennsylvania and upstate New York.

Viewers who can't wait until the start of season two won't be kept in total suspense. Just in time for Halloween, Animal Planet plants its viewers deep within the dark forests of Northern California with a two-hour FINDING BIGFOOT special, "The Squatchiest Place on Earth." Bigfoot Field Research Organization (BFRO) investigators hone in on the most infamous and disputed piece of Bigfoot evidence ever - the Patterson-Gimlin footage. Captured more than 50 years ago, the footage has been the center of the Bigfoot debate and has driven conspiracy theorists and Sasquatch enthusiasts on a quest to prove the creature's existence. Now, the BFRO researchers take Animal Planet cameras to the site where the footage was captured and scout out new sites where the best and most convincing Bigfoot footprints have been reported.

In FINDING BIGFOOT, a four-person team from the BFRO - a leading scientific research organization exploring the Bigfoot/Sasquatch mystery - investigates Sasquatch sightings by interviewing locals, examining evidence and infiltrating the woodlands and forests in places where Bigfoot has been reported. Led by the BFRO president Matt Moneymaker, crab fisherman James "Bobo" Fay, science educator Cliff Barackman and skeptical scientist Ranae Holland, the team listens to harrowing tales of run-ins with Bigfoot before generating reconstructions of the encounters to judge their plausibility or dismiss them as hoaxes. Then, outfitted with the latest technology, including night-vision and infrared cameras, the team sets out on exhilarating and eerie investigations where any broken branch or peculiar noise could mean a Sasquatch is lurking nearby.

FINDING BIGFOOT is produced for Animal Planet by Ping Pong Productions. Keith Hoffman is the executive producer for Animal Planet. Brad Kuhlman and Casey Brumels are the executive producers for Ping Pong Productions. Marc Etkind is Vice President of development for Animal Planet.

Local news station KTEN.com investigates Oklahoma's Bigfoot. Matt Moneymaker says this is the first time a "news channel has requested BF info thru social media."

HONOBIA, OK -- Nestled among the Kiamichi Mountains in eastern Pushmataha and western LeFlore counties lies Honobia, OK, a town with a history of strange sightings of an ape-like creature.

In Part I of "SASQUATCH! Oklahoma's Bigfoot", Kris Hair introduces you to Darrell Williams, a lifelong resident of the area, and for two days was our guide through the mountains and streams where the sightings of the large ape-like creatures are reported regularly.

The brothers HIllstrand, captains on The Deadliest Catch, look into Alaskan legends of the cryptid animal cadborosaurus. They start by viewing a video of the supposed beast taken by a local salmon fisherman. The video puzzles all of these experienced seamen and cryptozoologist Paul Leblond, too. (I'd be somewhat more impressed if they had a top marine biologist -- though Leblond's resume claims he was one, formerly.) The brothers then start outfitting for the trip as if they're on the world's biggest fishing trip. I am reminded of Quint's ill-fated venture to catch Jaws, and I am more than slightly disturbed when brother Andy declares, "Time to go kill a sea monster!"

Now, I don't watch Deadliest Catch, so I don't know if this is how these guys usually act, but their expedition seems irreverent at best. Methods include huge fishing lines with barrels as bobbers. They start at the mouth of a river, catch nothing, and then travel up to Lake Iliamna, which boasts a lot of monster reports. They overfly the lake with a pilot who saw the creature once. They talk to local Tim Laport, who suggests places to fish for the beast, and also suggests that it might be a sturgeon (an ancient type of huge fish). They repeat their barrel and bait operation, and succeed in losing their bait to ... something. Soon, one of their barrels ends up a mile away from where they set it, with the heavy hook bent straight. Then they spot something big and white (15' long?) in the water; so they fish for it, apparently hook it, and... the line breaks. Just another one that got away. What's left to do but throw a tantrum, toss dynamite in the water, and shoot the lake with automatic weapons.

I'm unimpressed. A better equipped, more scientific expedition might have gotten better evidence rather than just another fish story. I'm also vexed that the original video is not shown in its entirety -- making creature identification difficult for any home viewer. Monster? With this type of "evidence," who can say?

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

This latest sighting is from the great state of Iowa. Two adults decided to take some kids on a road trip, but it turned out to be one trip they'll never forget.

The original video is over 9 minutes long, so we decided to shorten it down to a little over 3 minutes for better viewing. Listen to the kids screaming and crying their eyes out as they watched the Bigfoot creature from across the road.

A fly fisher man on his way to the lake discovered an abandon cabin with an old newspaper from 1984 with the headline on its front cover: "Love-crazed bigfoot makes girl pregnant". The cabin seemed to capture the culture of the time. One viewer said he was drawn to old television set and the history of the people who must have been there.

Deadliest Catch captains Johnathan and Andy Hillstrand begin an adventure in their hometown of Homer, Alaska and go by air, land and sea to search for answers to the Bering Sea Monster mystery and hunt for the legendary “Cadborosaurus.”

There are thousands of ways to die, and this is one way. Dressing up like Bigfoot is not only illegal in some states, it's dangerous! Watch what could happen to you if you decide to put on a Monkey suit and start surprising hikers in the woods.

Monday, July 18, 2011

The footprint measured approximately 18 inches long and eight inches wide according to the Chatham Police Department report. The immense size of the print isn't fully appreciated until a hand is placed beside it.

Date: Wednesday, June 15, 2011Persons: Michael Patrick and motherLocation: Chatham, IllinoisContext: Michael Patrick’s mother was getting the liner to her pool changed at her residence, when workmen noticed an abnormally large footprint under the apple tree in the back yard and brought the footprint to Patrick’s attention. The night before the footprint was found a neighbor had also commented about unusual sounds.Source:www.sj-r.com

CHATHAM – There’s something amiss in the backwoods of Chatham, something potentially big. Lately there’s been talk around certain areas of town of an unusual howling and screeching sound as well as evidence of some very large footprints.

Since June there have been at least five to six instances of residents discovering or hearing evidence that the infamous Bigfoot may be lurking somewhere in the Chatham community. One case in particular has garnered some attention from local police, as well as a few proclaimed Big Foot experts.

On Wednesday, June 15, 2011, Michael Patrick’s mother was getting the liner to her pool changed at her residence, when workmen noticed an abnormally large footprint under the apple tree in the back yard and brought the footprint to Patrick’s attention.

Over the years Patrick and his mother had, at times, heard bizarre noises, but had always passed them off as coming from some common forest animal. But they weren’t the only ones that had heard the sounds either. The night before the footprint was found a neighbor had also commented about unusual sounds.

“My neighbor has a German Shepherd, and it heard something that night that spooked him. The dog went outside to investigate, but came back cowering, now it won’t leave its owner’s side,” Patrick said.

Unsure about what exactly the footprint was, and concerned for his mother’s safety, Patrick called the Chatham Police Department. An officer came to investigate the scene, but was unable to determine what might have caused the print.

“The responding officer stated that there was a large footprint approximately 18 inches long and 8 inches wide, and it appeared there were five claw marks,” Chatham Police Department Deputy Chief, Vernon Foli said.

To give you an idea how big 18 inches is, retired NBA center Shaquille O’Neil's feet are approximately 15 inches long, and he wears a size 23 shoe. The average human being’s foot measures approximately 9 ½ inches. Most shoe size charts end at a size fifteen shoe. An 18-inch footprint is about the size of a healthy newborn baby. Considering the size of the print, it’s understandable for a person to show a little concern if they found such a print in their yard.
Patrick documented his discovery on Facebook where he struck up a conversation with a friend. Patrick’s friend knew John Winterbauer, a Bigfoot investigator. Winterbauer in turn contacted local Bigfoot expert Stan Courtney.

Courtney has documented sightings and gathered sound recordings and evidence of Bigfoot for years. He has interviewed over two hundred witnesses who have seen Bigfoot.

“I literally know hundreds of people who’ve seen these animals. There have been lots of them in central Illinois. I’ve recorded lots of sounds that other researchers and witnesses believe come from these animals. People in Springfield don’t realize it, but there have been a lot of reports from the Sangamon River around Riverton.” Courtney said in a previous interview.

Courtney said that there have been five to six other reports of finding footprints and howling in the Chatham area since June.

So why is Bigfoot in Chatham? Well it’s hard to say really. Patrick’s property does back up to a wooded stream which flows into Lake Springfield. Courtney proposed that the creature was drawn to the house because of the apple tree that grows in Patrick’s mother’s back yard.

Stan Courtney explained to Patrick that the apple tree might have somehow been interpreted as a gift of food. In the past the Patrick’s had noticed that apples from the tree had been picked, but only to a certain height. They believed that the culprit was a wily raccoon, but the large footprint seemed to suggest otherwise. Courtney told Patrick that a creature such a Bigfoot will usually return the favor, and present a gift of its own as a show of appreciation in the form of a dead animal or a strange arrangement of flowers.

The day after his meeting with Courtney, Patrick discovered the Sasquatch’s gift, a decapitated rabbit, near his mother’s house. In Courtney’s account he stated that the rabbit had, “its head pulled off, not bitten or cut, but just simply pulled off.”

Since that strange June evening, no more incidents have occurred at Patrick’s mother’s residence. You might think that such a strange series of events would frighten most people in to staying out of the back yard, but the occurrence has not deterred Patrick’s mother from going about her normal routine.

“She’s not scared, she continues to do her yard work, she thinks it’s neat. My mom has never been skeptical of it.” Patrick said.

While his mother may not be skeptical of what happened, others aren’t ready to pin the event on Bigfoot just yet. Vernon Foli posed a possible explanation, albeit an indirect one.

“One thing I can tell you is that approximately ½ mile south of this location is the former Grindstone Valley Zoo that use to have exotic animals. The zoo is no longer in existence but the owner is Brad or Larry Reynolds and he still has some animals at this location,” Foli said.

Could the print have come from an animal from the old zoo? The Reynolds had kept large animals such as buffalo, antelope, elk, deer, tigers, leopards, monkeys, and zebras while the zoo was open. Or could it be a bear footprint? It’s widely believed by many that there are no bears in Illinois, but with their presence in neighboring states, Wisconsin and Missouri, would it be so far fetched to think that there are indeed bears in Illinois?

At this point it’s hard to tell what exactly made the footprint, but with other accounts of strange happenings and unusual howls and screeches in Chatham, many residents are raising an eyebrow.

“I definitely don’t think it was a hoax, and it was more than just a coincidence. I think that people should just be a bit more vigilant and careful, because you never know what you’re going to find out there,” Patrick said.

The footprint measured approximately 18 inches long and eight inches wide according to the Chatham Police Department report.

This is the apple tree in the back yard of Michael Patrick's mother's house where the Bigfoot footprint was found. The print was found by workmen who were installing a new pool liner for Patrick's mother.